Haven
by Princessstarryknight
Summary: Jesus's TBI has made his life more challenging that it's ever been. He feels like no one can truly love him anymore, until he meets a runaway foster girl named Erin and decides to shelter her at his home, but also hiding her from his family. Like him, she's also not entirely nuero-typical. Can they find a haven with each other? Read this tale of an epic romance to find out!
1. Chance Encounter

He knew he wasn't really supposed to be out on his own, given his condition still wasn't great, but Jesus decided to take a walk along the beach to help clear his head. He had dodged a bullet with Emma. After he rejected her in anger at Ana's engagement party he regretted it instantly. He had known Emma for so long. Everything was set up so perfectly, they started out as friends but they had always had feelings for each other. Plus, Marianna adored her and the two of them were best friends, that was super important to him considering how much he cared for his sister. And after Emma was so attentive to him when he got his TBI he knew she had to be the one for him. I mean that's what it was always like in the movies right? They always overcome obstacles and then end up together in the end. They had to be destined for each other. But he had ruined it all that night when he shared his true feelings of wanting to be with her forever. He was angry because she didn't feel the same. He was still mad about that. Why didn't she? She was supposed to be his soulmate. Wasn't she supposed to love him as much as he loved her? Nevertheless, he knew he couldn't be without her, so when he got the chance to talk to her at prom he lied and told her exactly what she wanted to hear. That would at least keep her with him until he got his head fixed and he was back to being himself again. He looked out over the beach and thought about love. It had been so easy to have it before his TBI. Now that he was deemed "broken" by everyone he knew it was a lot harder to keep that love. Everyone was just waiting for the old Jesus to come back. But what if he never did? What if Nick had killed the old Jesus and this is the closest anyone would ever get to him again? He tried to concentrate on the distant sounds of the waves crashing against the sand and he took a deep breath. _Why does love always have to be so hard for me?_ He thought. _Why am I never good enough for the girls I like? Why do I always have to fight to keep the hearts of those I love? Am I just destined to be alone?_ He looks up at the sky and sends up a little prayer. _Please, if I'm destined to be alone then fine, let me live alone and broken. It's better than worthlessly fighting for something I know I'll never have. But, on the off chance that you do have me being in love with someone forever in your plan for me, whether that be Emma or someone else, please, I'm begging you please send me a sign!_

Jesus was roughly interrupted from his silent prayer when a girl crashed into him. He stumbled a bit, but thankfully this girl wasn't really that big so she didn't have enough force to push over the larger teen. He looked down at the girl who had run into him and met her gaze. She had creamy peach skin with light blonde hair that was pulled into a side braid and she looked up at him shyly from where she was pressed against his chest with the brightest blue gaze he had ever seen. He never thought he would see a shade of blue that matched the sky so perfectly. He thought only Emma's blue eyes could shine so brightly, but this girl's eyes had hers beat. He gently held her in his arms and realized she was a rather skinny girl. She wasn't all skin and bones but she also didn't have that much meat on her either. She wore a loose blue long sleeve t-shirt and with the sleeves white. On the front in blue letters was the number 49 written in the same style as a jersey but the shirt she was wearing wasn't a jersey. She wore blue jeans, white converse, and had a medium sized pink backpack on. She was about the same size as Marianna, but maybe a little shorter and looked around the same age as him and his sister. The pink blush on her cheeks increased as the two of them stared at each other longer and neither of them made a move to move.

"S-sorry." They both say and move to the right together, attempting to pull apart but only causing them to still be in the same position but now a step to the right. Both of them had their faces heating up now.

"It's fine-" They both say and move together to the left, again, leaving their position unchanged.

Jesus smiled, starting to become very amused by this predicament. His smile must have been contagious because the girl pressed up against him smiled too.

"I'll just-uh." He says and backs up but at the same time she moves forward.

He takes a step forward and she moves back. They both look at each other and laugh. Finally she took a step back and so did he and they both pulled apart, ending the awkward surprise physical contact.

"Sorry about running into you and...everything after." The girl says and nervously plays with her braid. "I have ADHD so...y'know, awkward." She says and laughs nervously.

"It's a-alright." He tells her with some slight difficulty and plays with his thumbs. "I've got it to, and something else but uh...I get it." He says and smiles at her and shrugs. "You off to school?" He asks, pointing at her backpack.

"Uh, yeah." She says and smiles confidently.

He smiles confidently, crosses his arms over his chest and informs her "That must suck, having to start class at 4:30 in the afternoon?" Her smile falls and she seems nervous.

"I-I uh meant I'm coming back from school." She responds in a slightly unsure tone.

"You sure about that?" He asks and she sighs and her shoulders drop and she stares at the ground.

She hears a whistle blow and she suddenly perks up and turns around, on high alert like a gazelle that was about to be charged down by a lion. But there was no one behind her.

"Whoa calm down, just the lifeguard." He tells her. "You're at the beach."

"Oh yeah...right." She says and smiles at him.

"You okay?" He asks.

"I-I'm fine." She says then takes a few quick steps forward and gets behind him. Jesus turns to face her. "I've just got to get going." She says and before she takes off Jesus notices a toothbrush poking out of one of the zippered pockets of her backpack.

She runs down the sidewalk again for about a minute before it registers for the teen what's going on. Jesus had no idea what force pushed him to start running after her, but nevertheless here he was, running after a runaway foster girl in an attempt to do...something? His brain hadn't caught up to that part yet but he knew he wanted to halt this girl and find out what her deal was. He decided as he caught up to her it's because he wanted to help her.

"Wait!" He tells her and grasps her forearms gently before she crashes into him again. "You're a runaway aren't you?" He asks as he bends over a bit to try to be closer to her eye level and she looks at the ground. "I could tell from the toothbrush in your backpack. If you are running away I won't try to stop you. I'm adopted, and I have an adopted sister who was a runaway too once. Do you need any help?" She looked back up at him.

"No. I think I'm good. But thank you..uh...what's your name?" She asks him.

"Jesus." He answers after a moment and holds out his hand for her to shake.

"Erin." She says with a smile

She takes his hand and he tried not to laugh at how little her hand was in his but he couldn't help himself and he snickered.

"What's so funny?" Erin asks.

"You're so tiny." Jesus tells her and laughs and she frowns and crosses her arms.

"I'm not that small. I'm just two inches below the average height for girls. I think." She adds after her confident statement. "Besides, you seem really tall for a guy. What's the weather like up there in the clouds stretch?" She quips back at him.

"Pretty good." Jesus says. "The air's always cleaner the farther your head is from other people's asses." He quips back and bends over and holds his sides as he laughs at his own joke and Erin bit her lips to try to keep from laughing at his ridiculous joke but eventually she just couldn't help it and she ended up laughing too.

Jesus's face hardened when he saw a police car rounding the bend on the street, coming closer to where he and Erin were.

"Can cops see you?" He asks.

"No." She answers seriously.

"Then quick come with me." He tells Erin and slings an arm around her shoulders and walks her down to the boardwalk, standing slightly behind her so that the police in the car would have a harder time seeing her.

"Is the car gone?" She asks as they reach the railing. He looks behind them and nods.

"All clear." He tells her.

"Thank you." She tells him and he smiles.

"No problem." He says. He notices an ice cream stand and gets an idea. "Want some ice cream?" He offers and she looks confused.

"You're offering me food?" She asks.

"Yeah why not. Life on the run must be pretty tough. I'll get you something. My treat." He offers and she blushes and smiles at him.

The two of them walk down the boardwalk licking their matching ice cream cones.

"Where did you run away from?" He asks curiously.

"From a home in San Francisco." Erin says casually and Jesus spills some of his ice cream down his chin, surprised by her answer.

"San Francisco?" He repeats in a shocked tone. She nods. "When did you run away?"

"About a week ago. That's why I don't want the cops to spot me. My picture's still probably going around the state." Erin explains to him and Jesus nods in understanding.

"So did you run all the way here from San Francisco?" He jokes.

"Yeah actually I did." She says seriously but he doesn't seem to pick up the seriousness in her voice and laughs. "You think I'm joking?" She asks.

"Wait you're not?" He asks her.

"No. I've always been alone. My feet and whatever I can fit in my backpack are all I've got." She tells him and Jesus immediately feels sorry for her.

He couldn't imagine how she must have felt. At least he'd always had Marianna. But this girl...being alone her whole life...

"Not anymore." He says without thinking and she looks confused.

"What?" She asks, not understanding what he's saying.

"You don't have to be alone anymore." He tells her. "I'm going to help you." She laughed.

"Seriously?" She asks. "Look you're being really sweet but I don't need your charity." She says. "I can take care of myself. Besides, I've kind of already accepted the fact that I'm a lost cause. I'm not even worth your time. Thanks for the ice cream Jesus." She says and gives him a warm smile before continuing to walk down the boardwalk.

He sighed and looked down at his melted cone and tosses it in the trash. He watched Erin leave and processed what she said. Then, it clicked for him just how similar they were. They both had ADHD, had trouble connecting with people, liked the same flavor of ice cream...He thought about that little prayer he made earlier. His eyes widened when he realized...

"Wait!" Jesus calls after her and runs in front of her again and she stops walking. "I know how you feel. I'm kind of going through the same thing right now." He says and then takes a deep breath and starts to explain "I recently got a TBI and it's screwed up my whole life." Her eyes widen and she gasps. She must have some medical knowledge, he thought.

"I-I'm so sorry. It must be really hard for you and your family-" Erin says and he interrupts her.

"Yeah I know it sucks." He says in an unintentionally slightly rude tone. He was sick of the sympathy speech. "It's made my life really difficult and I really hate when people try to do things for me out of charity or treat me differently because now I'm 'special needs'. So instead of offering you to stay with me for as long as you need until you get back on your feet and all that bs how about I just offer for you to stay the night, unless you've got somewhere else to stay-"

"I actually did plan on staying somewhere." She tells him and his heart deflates.

"Oh. Okay then." He says, trying to hide his sadness.

"But your place sounds a lot better than my plan of curling up next to a dumpster." She adds and her heart warms at the sight of him getting visibly excited and happy.

"Alright then, let's go home." He says and offers her his hand to take.

She smiles at him and takes it. This time he doesn't make some comment about how tiny her hand was. He smiled when he realized how perfectly it fit in his. This was meant to be. He thinks to himself. As they walked back to his house and then at one point decided to race his mind was swimming with hope and excitement. Their chance encounter was the sign. Of that he was certain. He hoped she would stay more than one night, because he knew now the true nature of their meeting. God had sent him this girl, this guardian angel to help him learn how to get Emma to love him as much as he loves her.

 **A/N:** I hope you enjoyed the first part! The next will come soon! I'd also really enjoy some feedback so I can make this a better story for you guys and know that people like my story!


	2. Food for Thought

"You can stay in here." He says and opens the door to the garage and sneaks her inside. "I'll come back with some food in an hour. You're gonna have to hide here because my mom's a cop and she's probably seen your picture and would send you back to San Francisco."

"Your mom's a cop?" Erin asks and Jesus nods.

"Yeah but it's all good as long as she doesn't know you're here-" He starts to explain to ease her worries but she cuts him off.

"I know. This is perfect actually. That means the police won't search here for me. They'll assume that she would have found me here and turned me in. This is the perfect place for me to hide." Erin explains and smiles, prompting a grin to spread on Jesus's face. "Thank you."

"You're welcome. I'll be back with some food in an hour." He says and backs out of the room and closes the door.

That night during dinner everyone noticed that Jesus seemed unusually happy. He of course didn't tell them that this had to do with his new friend who he was hiding in their garage that he planned to employ to help teach him how to connect to people better. He wasn't neuro-typical anymore. And neither was this girl. So if he could learn how to connect with someone who's like him, that'll help him learn how to have a better connection with the people who aren't. She was going to teach him how to get Emma to fall in love with him. That and he was getting pretty lonely being stuck at the house while everyone is at school or work. It'd be nice to have a friend around to keep him company.

"You seem oddly happy lately Jesus." Lena notices and Jesus looks up at his moms, lettuce still hanging out of his mouth.

"Yeah did Emma send you nudes or something?" Jude asks and laughs before Brandon lightly slaps him in the back of his head.

"No." Jesus answers and glares at Jude. "Just a good day I guess. That walk I took really cleared my head." He says.

"Yes well it would have been nice if you told us you were going on a walk before hand." Stef says and Jesus rolls his eyes. "You know it's dangerous for you to be out on your own considering-"

"Yeah I know but that doesn't mean I'm helpless moms." Jesus angrily retorts.

"Okay okay honey calm down we were just worried about you that's all." Lena says and Jesus grumbles an apology and goes back to eating his chicken.

After dinner when everyone had retired to their various rooms Jesus snuck back downstairs and heated up some leftovers for Erin. He snuck out of the house to the garage, carrying the plate and he knocked on the door three times, letting her know it was him. Then he opened up the door and found her sitting on the couch, wearing a blue beanie and a quilt blanket wrapped around her.

"Chilly?" He asks.

"Just a bit." She tells him and huddles the blanket a little closer to herself.

He goes over to the corner and turns on a heater.

"That should help you out a bit." He tells her and smiles. "I also brought you some food." He says, showing her the plate of food.

She smiles and reaches out for it. He hands her the plate and she gratefully took it from him, both of them blushing as their hands touched briefly. Then she chowed down. He offered her a fork and knife but she didn't even take them. She tore the chicken apart with her hands and ate it like she was starving, which Jesus now realized she probably was. He stared in shock as she horked down all the food.

"So uh...you're hungry I see." Jesus notices and Erin slurps up the piece of chicken she was eating and nods.

"All I've been eating for the past three months is whatever food I can steal from fast food joints and loot out of grocery stores." Erin explains and licks her fingers clean. "It's not exactly fine dining."

"Three months?" Jesus asks. "I thought you said you only ran away a week ago?"

She stayed silent and looked down.

"Yeah...I was only able to escape a week ago. But the home I was in has neglected to feed me for much longer than that..." Erin admits and Jesus sighs.

"I'm sorry to hear that." He says. "But if you decide to stay here I can promise you you'll get a nice home cooked meal every night." She smiled at him.

"What's the catch?" She asks. "You promised me I wouldn't be here out of charity and that you'd put me to work somehow. So what do I have to do to keep getting these delicious home cooked meals?"

"Not much really." Jesus says. "I just need some relationship advice." She arches an eyebrow.

"And you think an awkward runaway girl with ADHD would be able to help you out with that?" She asks.

"Yeah." Jesus says. "Because I have ADHD too. And I just figured since you're a girl that you might be able to-"

"Okay just because I'm a girl doesn't mean I have relationship advice that can help you out." Erin says and laughs a bit. "I've never had a boyfriend before and not because I'm a lesbian. Because I'm not. I'm straight." Erin said, feeling the need to clarify. "But guys don't exactly like me because I'm not as girly as they'd like or I seem too weird or-"

"Okay then forget the relationship stuff. Honestly I don't know what I was thinking with that anyway. Must have been some crazy shit that my messed up brain came up with." He jokes and laughs, prompting the girl in front of him to crack a smile too. "Honestly you just seem like someone who's like me." Jesus says, getting serious. "Not neuro-typical, ADHD, can't seem to figure people out, you seem like you could use some help, and so could I so...I figured maybe we could just help each other out."

"I could try that for a little while." Erin says and Jesus smiles.

"Great. Then I'll leave you alone. I'll shine a light up in my window when it's safe for you to come in and use the bathroom. Do you think you can hold out staying out here until then?" He asks and Erin nods.

"It'll be fine." She tells him. "Thank you so much. For everything."

"You're welcome." Jesus says and then stands up to leave.

That night Erin slept better than she had ever. She was so comfortable in fact that she almost felt like she was at home before her mother died. She dreamt that her mother was tucking her into bed and placing a kiss upon her forehead before singing her to sleep softly. She used to sing her _All the Pretty Little Ponies_ by Kenny Loggins every night before she went to sleep. That was before her mother died anyway. Even now she could still hear it in her mind. Her mother singing to her about all of the pretty little ponies as she tucked her in bed and turned out the light. Erin was awoken however by someone who was definitely not her mother.

"Hey there sleepy head. How are you doing?" Jesus asks Erin after gently nudging her awake.

She yawned and stretched her arms out before sitting up to face Jesus. "I'm doing alright." She says and rubs her right eye. "What time is it?"

"Around 9 am. You can come into the main house now, everyone's gone." Jesus tells her and offers her his hand and she takes it and he pulls her up but in her sleepy state she stumbles and falls into his chest.

"Whoops. I'm so sorry." Erin says and pushes herself off of him and he laughs at her.

"Whoa slow your roll there girl, I've only known you for a day and you're already falling for me." Jesus jokes and Erin rolls her eyes and starts swatting at his chest as he laughs and turns around and starts walking away from her.

"Don't flatter yourself!" Erin scolds him as she runs up next to him to catch up to him as he heads inside the house. "Just because you look super hot doesn't mean that I'm going to just fall head over heels for you."

"So you admit I'm hot?" Jesus asks and smiles.

Erin groaned, mentally face palming from stroking the taller teen's ego.

"Yes Jesus you're hot but that doesn't mean I'd fall in love with you. My standards are a bit higher than that." Erin informs him and crosses her arms.

"Maybe that's why you've never had a boyfriend before." He tells her and she scoffs.

"Hey. It's not my fault you guys all have ridiculously high standards for girls." Erin says as the two of them step inside the kitchen. "If you took girls for who they are and not just their appearance then girls like me would be very high in demand."

"Yeah we need to get you laid." Jesus says and tosses her an orange.

"Hey! Sex doesn't solve relationship problems." Erin argues and Jesus takes a bite out of an apple.

"Well have you ever had sex before?" He asks and Erin looks sadly at her orange. "I'll take that as a no." She nods softly and Jesus noticed she looked a bit scared before she took a deep breath and started to peel her orange.

As she ate a slice she savored it like it was the most delicious thing she had ever had the pleasure of tasting. The sweet tanginess did wonders to her tastebuds.

"Wow, you must be really starving." Jesus notices and Erin nods.

"It's been years since I've had fresh food that tastes so good." Erin tells him and he hits the table and goes over to the fridge.

"Then today I'm going to be cooking the greatest food you've ever had." Jesus says and Erin smiles and he notices her visibly get happier at the promise of good food.

He opened up his phone, looking to play one of his playlists and then frowned at it. Then he remembered. He discreetly went over to one of the baskets by the sink and reached inside and pulled out something. He kept facing away from Erin, not wanting her to see him wearing his ridiculous looking glasses. But the girl noticed him put them on and a mischievous look came over her face. She smiled and ran up to face him and he jumped and his eyes widened when he realized she caught him with his glasses on and he quickly took them off.

"You don't have to hide your glasses from me." Erin tells him and smiles. "Put them back on." She insists and Jesus slowly puts them back on and looks at her and she smiles even brighter and giggles a bit.

"Yeah I know I look ridiculous." Jesus says.

"Actually I was going to say you look cute. You look ten times hotter with your glasses on." Erin says and Jesus arches an eyebrow and tries to ignore the way his heart leapt when she said that endearing comment.

"I look hotter with these ridiculous things on?" He asks her. "God you are weird."

The two of them spend the whole morning cooking food and Jesus's heart warmed at how happy Erin seemed to be having so many fresh vegetables and fruits at their disposal. He was glad he could make someone feel so happy. Maybe he wasn't a complete failure. Although they did have to break out the fire extinguisher a few times because Erin didn't know how to cook and Jesus wasn't exactly in the best condition to be operating a stove top on his own. So they decided to stick to making salads and stuff that required minimal oven and stove use. And in the meantime the two of them found themselves dancing along to some of Jesus's tunes.

Even though Erin didn't really understand a lot of the words, she seemed to really like _Despacito_. Jesus put that one on repeat and he and Erin danced around the kitchen and living room to it. He told her how he was working on learning the words to this song since his memory still wasn't that great and how he wanted to sing it to Emma once he could remember it. Erin thought that was really sweet of him and assured her that Emma would enjoy a gift like that on the basis that any girl would love a gift that came from the heart. But for now she was graced with Jesus trying to sing the song and teaching her how to salsa as they made salsa, while listening to _Despacito_ which resulted in a lot of toe stepping and giggling as he held her hands and taught her how to move her steps in time with his.

Eventually they ditched the intricacies of that and Jesus opted to just twirl her around the living room, singing along to the song, helping correct her pronunciation of some of the words when needed. Which was very often. Then suddenly out of nowhere as they were dancing he scooped her up in his arms and she shrieked as he held his arms around her waist and she wrapped hers around his neck and looked straight into his eyes.

"I was getting bored of looking down at you so I figured I'd just pick you up to my eye level." Jesus tells her simply and she blushes and her eyelashes flutter. Erin never noticed how pretty his brown eyes were, or how safe she felt in his strong arms. "Is this okay?"

"Yeah." Erin says and smiles. "Next time just give me some warning okay?"

"Sure thing short stack." He teases and she frowns at him and he laughs. "You know you're really cute when you frown like that."

"Don't use that as an excuse to get me angry you giant idiot." Erin quips back.

"I don't know it's really tempting." Jesus says. "But if I've learned anything from my twin sister it's that you definitely don't want to get short people angry so I think I'd rather have you ugly and happy than cute and mad."

"Hey!" She says and punches his chest.

"I'm joking. You're cute no matter how you're feeling." He tells her honestly, looking into her eyes and Erin calms down and looks into his.

"You think I'm cute?" She asks him and he nods.

"Yeah. You really are Erin. Any guy who's refused to give you the time of day based on your looks clearly doesn't see what I see in front of me right now." He says honestly.

Her stubbornness told her to hold her ground from all the teasing, but her heart was telling her to forgive this big idiot for some reason. The teens stared at each other for awhile but then the silent tension was broken by the sound of the door opening and Lena's voice calling:

"Jesus I'm home!"

Erin and Jesus looked at each other, eyes wide in fear.


End file.
